


Over the Hills (and Far Away)

by kitsune



Category: Torchwood
Genre: Friendship, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-10-05
Updated: 2012-10-05
Packaged: 2017-11-15 17:04:10
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,236
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/529553
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kitsune/pseuds/kitsune
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Toshiko is struggling in the aftermath of her relationship with Mary.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Over the Hills (and Far Away)

**Author's Note:**

> I've always felt that Tosh was criminally underused and underappreciated in Torchwood, and wanted to give her some friendship and attention. Set between first series Episode 10 and 11. Written in 2007, so details may have been jossed since then.
> 
> This story is based on beloved but vague childhood memories of walking holidays in Wales. Not welshpicked, so apologies for any errors or omissions.

“Are you coming, Tosh? Jack and Owen are ready. I don’t know where Ianto is.”

“Thank you, Gwen, but I’ve plans this weekend and I need to get home.”

“Really?” Gwen asked with unflattering surprise. “Well. That’s lovely then. We’ll have a drink and think of you.” Toshiko doubted it. Gwen would spend her time at the pub exchanging spiteful comments with Owen and looking puppy-eyed at Jack. She felt a little sorry for her. Whatever or whoever Gwen was doing, it wasn’t making her happy.

By the door Jack and Owen already had their coats on and were looking towards the women, Owen tapping at his watch. Walking away, Gwen called out to them, “Tosh has better things to do tonight.” Owen said something in a caustic tone that made Jack and Gwen laugh, and Toshiko flinched, feeling like a teenager again. Ianto walked up to her, his coat neatly folded over his arm. “Are you ready, Toshiko?” His words carried clearly to the three by the door. As they turned back to her in astonishment, she felt a little flush of pleasure. But she kept her expression composed and hoped he could read ‘thank you’ in her eyes.

“Yes, and I hope it’s as wonderful as you’ve led me to believe,” she said lightly. He held her coat for her, donned his own, and they walked to the door together. Jack looked from her to Ianto and smirked. She didn’t know what he was thinking and desperately wanted to leave before everyone found out. They all left the building and the other three went toward the pub, Gwen still glancing back at them incredulously. She traded a small smile with Ianto and as they walked to their cars she said, “Eight o’clock, right?”

“Yes. It’s best to get an early start. I’ll see you tomorrow.” He walked away to his own car and she drove home.

 

 

 

The next morning she followed the directions he’d given her and pulled into the public car park at the edge of a village. She turned off the engine and sat, brooding. A tap on the window startled a yelp from her, and after unlocking the door and getting out she explained, “I keep thinking about the last time we were out in the middle of nowhere.”

Ianto looked a little queasy at the reminder but seemed compelled to defend the Welsh countryside. “Statistically, only a very small proportion of villages harbor cannibals,” he said earnestly.

“Really? Because before today my experience has been 100%,” she retorted.

“I think that just means you don’t get out enough,” he said.

There was no reply to that because it was sadly true, so she pulled out her rucksack, and locked the car. “I have everything on the list you gave me, survival kit and all. I’m set for anything.” She was relieved to see him pull out a satnav as well as an ordnance survey map and compass. He spread the map out on the boot of her car and showed her the way they were going to go. Lunch was indicated with a pencilled circle.

“There’s a pub here,” he said. “It’s more than halfway, and makes a good stopping point.”

“You told me to bring sandwiches and water,” she said, taken aback.

“Oh, you’ll want those well before lunch, trust me.”

They wove between the parked cars and climbed over the stile into a field. They walked along the stone walls until they came to the other side, another stile, and open hills. He did something with the satnav unit and tucked it in his own rucksack, then consulted the map briefly before folding it into his anorak pocket and dropping the cord for the plastic compass around his neck. “This way.”

He walked briskly and she was soon falling behind and panting. “I’m not going to last long,” she gasped.

“Sorry, I forget you’re not used to this.” He slowed and dropped back beside her. “We’re doing this backwards. You should set the pace.”

“So you think this is fun?” she asked a few minutes later, breathing easier but still feeling daunted.

“I find the silence very soothing. And the exercise is beneficial. You’ll feel better once you get your second wind.”

The sense of isolation was overwhelming. No trace of humanity visible aside from their own footprints, erased by the grass springing back as soon as they’d passed, or the rocks which took no human imprint at all. A temporal shift could occur and they’d never notice, whether it was 50 or 500 years. The only sound was her own breathing and the scuff of their feet on the ground. They crossed a small lane once, and she glanced wistfully along its nice level surface until Ianto gestured her across and up another hill. She was starting to feel an ache in her thighs and calves. But at least the concentration required to get breath and body working together made her focus on something besides the thoughts roiling in her head.

 

 

After Jack destroyed Mary, Ianto led her into the conference room and made her a cup of tea, while she tried to control the hiccups that crying always gave her. They sat at the table and she wondered tiredly why he had chamomile and honey on hand. He spoke quietly of immediate, commonplace things. Jack wanted this report. Could he pull it off her computer? Had she driven to work? Did she need a ride home? Yes, yes, and no. When she awkwardly stammered “thank you” through another round of tears, he’d reminded her, “You brought me coffee.” She was touched that he remembered her clumsy attempt at consolation, and relieved that he was better at expressing it. In the following days she found his calm, matter of fact attitude easier to take than Gwen’s sincere but grating sympathy, or Owen’s prickly blend of irritation and pity. Ianto had silently left endless cups of coffee by her elbow and once a clean, starched handkerchief, as she sat hunched over her keyboard, hiding from everyone’s solicitous eyes.

They had already fallen into the habit of eating lunch together, when there wasn’t a boisterous group meal. One or the other would order salads and they’d relax at the conference table with casual, desultory conversation. The invitation to go walking in the hills was unexpected, and she resisted the reflexive impulse to decline. It was a side of him she didn’t know. It would be something different to do, and at worst would result in boredom and blisters. At best there would be another tentative step towards friendship, and she currently had about as many friends as she did lovers.

 

 

“How long have you been doing this?” she asked, proud that her voice now held only a little breathlessness of oxygen deprivation.

He smiled down at her. Some of the tension he habitually carried at the Hub had fallen away, and she was reminded that he was the youngest of their group, although hardly the most immature. “All the time, before university. It seemed like I lived out here. But in London I got used to city life, and then I started at Torchwood and met Lisa. There was always something more urgent to do.”

“And you started again– ?”

His mouth quirked ironically. “After Lisa. I didn’t know what to do, I hadn’t had a life in so long. And one day I drove out to the hills and got out of the car and just stood there, listening to the wind. It was so quiet.” His voice trailed off, and he said, more to himself than to her, “I almost felt at peace.” When she glanced at his face, his expression was remote and contemplative.

A chill feathered across her neck and the breath she caught had nothing to do with exercise. He never asked her what she had heard with the pendant. She never mentioned it, but neither had she forgotten. “Did you bring a gun with you?” she asked softly, trying to match his even tone. He glanced at her, but didn’t reply.

They were climbing now, a steeper slope littered with rocks half hidden by long grass. She needed all her breath to keep going, which was just as well, since she didn’t know what to say. At the crest of the hill, signs became visible. They were old and rusted and entirely in Welsh. “What are those? What’s here?”

He caught her elbow as she tripped over a rock. “It’s an abandoned quarry. Watch your step.” They walked over to the edge delineated with a metal fence and looked through it. The bottom was a long way down, and pulled at her through the diamond-shaped spaces. She shivered, and turned away. “I’m starving. Can we eat now?” They sat on rocks and ate sandwiches. He drew a bottle of lemonade out of his rucksack and they shared it, saving her water for later.

He checked the map and indicated a direction. They started again, and she found she could move a little quicker now that she was picking up the rhythm. He seemed content to walk in silence. She finally blurted, “What stopped you?” Once the words were out, she realized how intimate the question was, beyond the cautious friendliness they’d offered each other so far. “The gun,” she clarified. He nodded, unoffended.

“Jack, I suppose. He said some things to me after Lisa…that night.”

“We didn’t know what was going on after he threw you in the interrogation room. He came upstairs, talked to Owen for a minute, turned off the cameras, and yelled at us all to clean up and go home. Then he went back down. He was really angry. It’s the first time I was a little afraid of him. Just as we were leaving he came up again. I think we were all wondering if he’d shot you.”

“Mmm. I stood by the car for a while, and then I started walking, thinking about what he’d said. Stupid, because I wasn’t prepared or paying attention, and I got lost. I was wandering around, chilled and exhausted, when I realized that I was trying to survive, which seemed pointless if I was going to use the gun. I finally found the car, drove home, and slept the rest of the weekend. And the next week I had more time that I didn’t know what to do with, so I came back.”

She wondered how many times he’d circled through that series of decisions. At least he’d had the excuse of passionate devotion and love. Her affair and betrayal both seemed petty by comparison. I don’t even get the consolation of having the most heart-breaking story, she thought glumly. She was hurt and angry, but suicide had never been an option. Did Jack know? Ianto had had two traumatic experiences recently. He still didn’t talk much about himself, and she didn’t know if anybody had yet asked how he was doing. Before, she would have considered it prying. She shook her head. She was tired of fretting over loves and lovers and death. “How long until lunch? You're right, I am getting hungry again.”

“Over that hill.” It was farther than the casual statement made it sound. It took another half hour to get to the top, where she could see a cluster of buildings in a small valley sheltering at the foot of the hill. Ianto led the way down and to the pub. The interior was clean and bright and modern. Some people probably grumbled about the lack of atmosphere, but she was grateful. The stone buildings provided enough déjà vu anyway for them both to shudder at the proffered steak and kidney pie and order fish and chips instead.

“I am never going to be able to eat a meat pie again,” she said with dismay.

“Not unless you make it yourself,” he agreed. “But the beer’s good. And your cannibalistic Welsh village experience has now dropped to 33%, if you count the village where we parked.”

“We’re not out of here yet,” she muttered darkly.

While they waited for their food, she played with her glass, moving it restlessly in small circles over the table. She couldn’t decide if it would be good manners to ask him more about himself or if friendship would dictate leaving a delicate subject alone, or vice versa. Although he didn’t seem to resent her asking. Well, they had to do something until the food came, and there wasn’t much to say about their walk beyond ‘quiet’ and ‘green’, and the ever popular ‘hilly’.

“Do you still think about Lisa?”

He looked up from the coasters he was stacking in a neat pile. “Every day.”

And for pure curiosity’s sake, “Why do you stay?”

He pushed the coasters away. “If you leave Torchwood you’re retconned. No exceptions. I’d lose even my memories of her. That would add another betrayal to the list. I’m trying to break the habit.”

“But you wouldn’t remember.”

“I would still have done it. I feel like part of the team now. To be trusted again and throw it away a second time seems…wasteful. Ungrateful, perhaps. And Jack would be disappointed in me.”

She studied her glass, the way the liquid moved as she tilted it back and forth. “Why is he so forgiving? You, me, Owen, Gwen. We’ve all done things that are unacceptable. He gets angry, but he takes us back. He seems to understand, somehow.” Ianto just nodded and drank some beer. So. She could have his secrets, but not Jack’s. She could respect that.

She took a deep breath. “How do you trust yourself to love again?” She squirmed at asking so bluntly, but it was the one thing she most needed to know. She’d finally managed to startle him. He looked up and met her eyes. “What?” he asked warily.

“You and Jack.”

“Oh.” He said carefully, “I’m not _in_ love with him. I don’t know when I’ll be ready to think about romance. But there’s affection, comfort, distraction. You know Jack. Life seems so complicated, and somehow he brings you around to his point of view that it’s actually quite simple. If you’re looking for solace I’m sure he would –”

“No!” she exclaimed, horrified. “I never want my personal life to connect with work again.” The one thing she completely understood about Gwen was her determination to keep Rhys apart from Torchwood at any cost.

He shrugged and took another sip, and she couldn’t tell if he’d been serious or not. “How did you know?”

“Everyone does. The two of you don’t seem to flirt much any more; you’re, I don’t know, polite. But, he would always touch you – a hand on your shoulder or something. We all know what he’s like. Now you sort of…lean into him a little when he does it.”

He flushed. “I didn’t realize that. But I didn’t know anyone was paying attention.”

“Um, we had an office pool going.” She bit her lip and mumbled, “Actually, Gwen and Owen asked me if I knew, but I didn’t, so they tried to get me to ask you just when, you know, so we know who won.” He took a moment to untangle the sentence, then said, “Tell them they can ask Jack if they want to know.” She laughed softly at the thought, although she wondered if he’d tell them, either. Jack wouldn't care who knew, but he was perfectly capable of being coy out of mischief.

With morbid curiosity Ianto asked, “How long was this pool going?”

“I’m not sure. On my first day Owen and Suzie asked me if I wanted to join. Every time someone’s day passed, they’d throw some more money in and pick another one. There’s a lot of money at stake by now. Nobody thought it would take so long.” She saw him wince. “Sorry.”

“No, I asked.”

The food came and the subject was closed. She was hoping for a longer respite, but he insisted on leaving as soon as they finished eating. “You’ll just get more tired if you sit around,” he said firmly.

Ianto checked his map again before they set out, and pointed her in the right direction before following her on the narrow track over yet another hill. She was glad they had gone more than halfway before stopping, because now her legs felt heavy and clumsy. She got back into a rhythm part of the time, but couldn’t seem to sustain it. On a water break she said as much, handing him her bottle and leaning over to catch her breath. He nodded and said briefly, “Practice.” For the next two hours their conversation was mostly directions from him and acknowledging grunts from her. Occasionally he would point out some interesting feature of the terrain, which she would dutifully glance at before going back to concentrate on putting one foot in front of the other. She _would not_ ask how much farther.

Finally Ianto was helping her stumble over the last stile and they were back by her car in the car park. She tossed her rucksack in and pulled the sweat soaked t-shirt away from her back. “Ugh," she muttered, "I need a shower and a long nap.” She closed the boot and turned to him.

“Thank you. For everything. I don’t think all this fresh air and exercise is for me. I’m a bit lost without my laptop or anything. But…it was good. Maybe once a year, or the next time I do something really stupid.” Impulsively she reached up and kissed him on the cheek. After a moment’s hesitation he put one arm around her shoulders and gave her a brief hug.

“Take a hot bath tonight,” he advised her. “You won’t be saying thank you tomorrow.”

She waved goodbye from her car and started home with a slightly lighter heart.

 

 

“How was your weekend, Tosh?” Gwen stood inquisitively at her side, and she smiled blandly back. Damned if she was going to admit she’d spent six hours on Saturday walking in the countryside and all of Sunday limping around her flat. “It was fine, thank you.” That was even mostly true.

With impeccable timing Ianto appeared on the other side. “Would either of you like coffee?” he asked courteously. “I’ve just started a fresh pot.”

Gwen eyed him speculatively. “Did you have a nice weekend, Ianto?”

“Of course,” he said immediately. “It’s always a pleasure to spend time with Toshiko. She just needs to work on her stamina. But she probably didn’t enjoy herself as much as I hoped.”

“Oh no,” she protested, laughing. “I enjoyed the experience, it’s just not something I would do on a regular basis.” She smiled at him. She could say more under the guise of teasing Gwen than she would feel comfortable with in a serious conversation. “The invitation was so thoughtful of you, and it really meant a lot to me. I certainly feel it’s brought us,” she dropped her eyes demurely, “closer.”

He said quietly, “And sometimes it’s good to know someone cares.”

Gwen glanced uncertainly between them, then stalked back to her own area. Ianto drifted off to ask Owen and Jack about coffee, and Toshiko returned her attention to where she knew she was always needed, work.


End file.
